Authors Aren’t Competition

I swear to Thor, I was going to write this post before the whole Cockygate debacle.

What’s Cockygate, you ask? I won’t spill any more virtual ink on this topic, but here’s the lowdown: Some crazy author tried to trademark the word “cocky,” and then she tried to get Amazon to pull ANY OTHER ROMANCE BOOKS with the word “cocky” in the title. (Want more? Check out Jenny Trout’s fantastic summary of the entire shit-show by clicking here.)

Does this affect me?

On the other hand, yes. This affects all writers, indie and traditional. It also affects anyone who might be just a teensy bit alarmed by the concept of trademarking a freaking word.

But really, this whole Cockygate debacle bothers me because it treats other authors as competition, as if writing a novel were some sort of epic Highlander battle in a crumbling castle during a thunderstorm…

The things people do to make money. This doesn’t surprise me not one bit. I think Disney has done a lot of this to keep writers from exploring new ways a story can be told. I just hope this nonsense doesn’t get out of hand.